shawms and cymbals and harps of gold
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: It's quiet before and after, but all of them scream and shine during their swan songs.
1. quite beforesong

**A/N:** Collection is titled after a line in the poem "The Dying Swan" by Tennyson. Part of what comes up in the Wikipedia entry on "swan song". :D

Written for:

Diversity Writing Challenge, i1 - a ficlet collection consisting of ficlets under 1000 words  
Symphogear bingo, the non-flash version, #025 – moving ever forward

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 **shawms and cymbals and harps of gold**  
 _1._ _quiet beforesong_

It's quiet on the set. Too quiet. The echo of Kanade's restlessness has long since faded into the gloom and there is only Tsubasa, wrapped in a cloak of darkness and watching the shadows sway to and fro.

Kanade would have been dancing to those shadows and pulling her in as well, but Kanade isn't here and Tsubasa can't dance by herself. By her standards, she can't dance at all. There is no fluid grace in her steps unless she has a sword in hand…and maybe that made Kanade her sword as well, once upon a time, or maybe that was just Kanade who could make anyone dance.

She could even made the Noise dance to their deaths while Tsubasa just cut them down with her sword.

But now the Noise came onto her battlefield alone, and she was the lone hero to strike them all down and wait for the final enemy that may never come. And she would bleed from every crevice and thensome in that final battle and fall like the sacrificial maiden of revolution, because she was incomplete, un-whole. Would there be anyone who could sing their swan song more than once, she wondered? Or would they bleed on the battlefield and take their little pickings until they found themselves outnumbered and outmatched, and then detonate like a suicide bomber to take out a wide radius and themselves as well.

That's the sort of life they lead, the sort of life they've _chosen_ to lead but that's not really true either, is it? Kanade wouldn't have had to choose such a life if the Noise hadn't reached her and her family on an otherwise quiet and peaceful day… Tsubasa would have probably found herself there anyway, things being as they are, but not Kanade. Kanade whose bright eyes go bloodshot every time she needs a booster, and yet she endures it all anyway because it means she can sing and she can fight.

But Kanade's not enduring anymore. Or maybe her swan song is the only way she could have endured that battle with Tsubasa too far away.

Either way, it is now Kanade who's too far away. And shadows weren't good painting tools. Kanade was bright, fiery: she could pretend to see her in a flame but not the shadows. And backstage was quiet. Dim. Waiting for the dazzling lights of the stage that would blind her like Kanade had swept into her life and blinded her.

And then they'd sing together, on that stage while she stood alone.

They still sung together, even when she stood on the stage alone.

The curtains crept up. The shadows slip back. Tsubasa takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. There are shadows there too. Shadows in the heart, in the soul, in the mind… Shadows Kanade could have breezed through with a grin and a poke to her side.

Instead, it's just the shadow of her voice in the name the audience screams as the curtains lift all the way and cast the spotlight on Tsubasa.

She's a one-winged lone angel now, but that's the song they came to hear…and when she begins to sing, the faint wisp of Kanade's swan song will join her.

Their song goes on.


	2. black and white

**A/N:** Written for the Symphogear non-flash bingo, #158 - you are my sunshine.

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 **shawms and cymbals and harps of gold  
** _2\. black and white_

Their hair is light and dark and that seems to be the only obvious part of their yin-yang relationship – until Shénshòujìng happens, anyway.

Maybe if Shénshòujìng hadn't happened, they'd have danced around each other in the sky.

No, that wasn't right either. Shénshòujìng was just somewhere in the middle of a long list of other things for Hibiki. For Miku, too, even if that was the only time she harmonised with a Relic and transformed. In any case, that was forced and she'd suffered through the withdrawals (and that was some potent stuff, to get withdrawals from a single dose – but it had ripped Kanade's body to shreds before her swan song too…) and that was the end of that chapter. It had given them both a glimpse of another side of her, though.

But it began well before that. With the Noise. One could even say with Kanade, even if Miku herself had never met the woman. She'd seen the posters though, and heard the songs. And missed the one fateful song that meant their peaceful lives spiralled out of control.

But the sun didn't shine nearly as bright on bland days. And the night didn't look quite so dark either. They were light and dark but their peaceful lives caused them to blend into a soft grey and they didn't realise, didn't need to realise…

And then Hibiki almost died. And Miku cried.

Which was entirely reasonable, and then Hibiki got better and they were closer than ever: too close. Miku carried with her the weight of worry and guilt and what-ifs… What if she'd been there? What if she'd never invited Hibiki and bailed even if she'd had a good reason if nothing had happened at that concert – But things did happen. An entire crowd dead except Hibiki. Half of Zwei Wing dead. Amou Kanade dead. Hibiki with scars dancing above her heart even now but at least she was still alive.

Would she have died too, Miku wondered? Or would she also have been alive?

Dead, probably. She was just a civilian and the only Relic that ever chose her was the one who heard the calling forced into her veins. That hardly counted. Hibiki, on the other hand… Well, Gungnir chose her. Gungnir and Amou Kanade saved her.

And Hibiki saved the world. And Miku. That was how it went.

And then Hibiki disappeared and Miku cried over her grave. That was how it went as well.

And then Hibiki appeared again, and that time in the middle was like an eclipse had swept in, covered up the sun, and disappeared again. That eclipse had been the absence of HIbiki. The sun came back with her return. And they were closer than ever and further away than ever and maybe it was because Hibiki had touched the sun but Miku had only drowned in grey. They dressed in black for mourning but mourning was really grey, not black. Death was black. Evil was black too and maybe that was a little unfair to the colour black but that was just the way things were.

And then there was Shénshòujìng and even Hibiki's radiant light hadn't quite reached at first and maybe Hibiki hadn't even needed that, seeing so many terrible things…

But when Miku's grey turned black, it was the perfect canvas for the white light from Hibiki to shine. Not brown or yellow, but white.

Black and white.


	3. reasons why she fights

**A/N:** Written for the Symphogear non-flash bingo, #049 - you know their answer, don't you?

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 **shawms and cymbals and harps of gold  
** _3\. reasons why she fights_

She wondered how many people who knew them both wished she'd sacrificed herself instead of Serena.

She wondered how many people realised it wasn't even possible. That the only reason she could use a Relic in the first place was because of the LiNKER and it still didn't resonate with her as clearly as her younger sister's seemed to – Or maybe that was just her hesitation speaking: the tug of war with her heart and fortune and gods only ever favoured the bold.

Or so they said. But Serena was the bold one. Not her. Serena was the younger of them but the one who danced with danger like she was the torch to attract the firelights so the rest of them would be safe. She was the bait who drew all the Noise to her and then crushed them so no-one else got close. She was the one who took her opponents out in one decisive hit.

Not like Maria who needed a drug to just stay synchronised with her Relic and even that wouldn't last forever. Like Amou Kanade who was choking on her blood by the end of it. She and Kirika and Shirabe… They'd all wind up like that, in the end. And yet they couldn't _not_ fight. They had to fight.

She, for herself, had to fight for Serena. Had to fight to fill in those shoes her brave little sister left behind.

She couldn't do it, though. The LiNKER was proof of that. The lies that spilt from her lips every time she fought were testament to that as well. She wasn't Fine. She just had to say she was but then she wasn't fighting as herself and all of those things were chains – heavy chains – that weighed her down. And maybe that was why she just went back and fought. Who was fighting? Who was she fighting for? It was a mess inside her head and the things right in front her weren't enough. Kirika and Shirabe weren't enough. Serena wasn't enough. Kirika and Shirabe were fighting for the same lie, the same indescribable thing she was and Serena was dead.

No doubt she wouldn't even be fighting if Serena had still been alive.

And there was the problem, probably. She was the elder sister. She should've been the one protecting her brave little Serena but Serena was the one who stood up instead, because Maria shied away from it all.

Maybe her heart was weak. Maybe that's why the Relic didn't want her. Maybe that was why she hadn't earned the right to a Relic without the need for LiNKER to augment it. And maybe that was why she never won.

Oh, she defeated Noise. But Noise weren't the only enemies she had to fight. She was part of something bigger, after all. Something more than saving small clusters of people when the Noise struck. Serena did that. And Serena had crumbled without support, fishing small fish because she couldn't sit and watch what was going on right in front of her but she'd never looked back either…

Maybe Maria shouldn't have looked back either, but she wouldn't have been able to fight otherwise. What she was truly fighting for was muddled in grey – many reasons, or no reason at all – but she knew she had to keep fighting for now, until she understood.


End file.
